IV. Error and the Ego

T-3.IV.1. The abilities you now possess are only shadows of your real strength. ² All of your present functions are divided and open to question and doubt. ³ This is because you are not certain how you will use them, and are therefore incapable of knowledge. ⁴ You are also incapable of knowledge because you can still perceive lovelessly. ⁵ Perception did not exist until the separation introduced degrees, aspects and intervals. ⁶ Spirit has no levels, and all conflict arises from the concept of levels. ⁷ Only the Levels of the Trinity are capable of unity. ⁸ The levels created by the separation cannot but conflict. ⁹ This is because they are meaningless to each other.

T-3.IV.2. Consciousness, the level of perception, was the first split introduced into the mind after the separation, making the mind a perceiver rather than a creator. ² Consciousness is correctly identified as the domain of the ego. ³ The ego is a wrong-minded attempt to perceive yourself as you wish to be, rather than as you are. ⁴ Yet you can know yourself only as you are, because that is all you can be sure of. ⁵ Everything else is open to question.

T-3.IV.3. The ego is the questioning aspect of the post-separation self, which was made rather than created. ² It is capable of asking questions but not of perceiving meaningful answers, because these would involve knowledge and cannot be perceived. ³ The mind is therefore confused, because only One-mindedness can be without confusion. ⁴ A separated or divided mind must be confused. ⁵ It is necessarily uncertain about what it is. ⁶ It has to be in conflict because it is out of accord with itself. ⁷ This makes its aspects strangers to each other, and this is the essence of the fear-prone condition, in which attack is always possible. ⁸ You have every reason to feel afraid as you perceive yourself. ⁹ This is why you cannot escape from fear until you realize that you did not and could not create yourself. ¹⁰ You can never make your misperceptions true, and your creation is beyond your own error. ¹¹ That is why you must eventually choose to heal the separation.

T-3.IV.4. Right-mindedness is not to be confused with the knowing mind, because it is applicable only to right perception. ² You can be right-minded or wrong-minded, and even this is subject to degrees, clearly demonstrating that knowledge is not involved. ³ The term "right-mindedness" is properly used as the correction for "wrong-mindedness," and applies to the state of mind that induces accurate perception. ⁴ It is miracle-minded because it heals misperception, and this is indeed a miracle in view of how you perceive yourself.

T-3.IV.5. Perception always involves some misuse of mind, because it brings the mind into areas of uncertainty. ² The mind is very active. ³ When it chooses to be separated it chooses to perceive. ⁴ Until then it wills only to know. ⁵ Afterwards it can only choose ambiguously, and the only way out of ambiguity is clear perception. ⁶ The mind returns to its proper function only when it wills to know. ⁷ This places it in the service of spirit, where perception is changed. ⁸ The mind chooses to divide itself when it chooses to make its own levels. ⁹ But it could not entirely separate itself from spirit, because it is from spirit that it derives its whole power to make or create. ¹⁰ Even in miscreation the mind is affirming its Source, or it would merely cease to be. ¹¹ This is impossible, because the mind belongs to spirit which God created and which is therefore eternal.

T-3.IV.6. The ability to perceive made the body possible, because you must perceive something and with something. ² That is why perception involves an exchange or translation, which knowledge does not need. ³ The interpretative function of perception, a distorted form of creation, then permits you to interpret the body as yourself in an attempt to escape from the conflict you have induced. ⁴ Spirit, which knows, could not be reconciled with this loss of power, because it is incapable of darkness. ⁵ This makes spirit almost inaccessible to the mind and entirely inaccessible to the body. ⁶ Thereafter, spirit is perceived as a threat, because light abolishes darkness merely by showing you it is not there. ⁷ Truth will always overcome error in this way. ⁸ This cannot be an active process of correction because, as I have already emphasized, knowledge does not do anything. ⁹ It can be perceived as an attacker, but it cannot attack. ¹⁰ What you perceive as its attack is your own vague recognition that knowledge can always be remembered, never having been destroyed.

T-3.IV.7. God and His creations remain in surety, and therefore know that no miscreation exists. ² Truth cannot deal with errors that you want. ³ I was a man who remembered spirit and its knowledge. ⁴ As a man I did not attempt to counteract error with knowledge, but to correct error from the bottom up. ⁵ I demonstrated both the powerlessness of the body and the power of the mind. ⁶ By uniting my will with that of my Creator, I naturally remembered spirit and its real purpose. ⁷ I cannot unite your will with God's for you, but I can erase all misperceptions from your mind if you will bring it under my guidance. ⁸ Only your misperceptions stand in your way. ⁹ Without them your choice is certain. ¹⁰ Sane perception induces sane choosing. ¹¹ I cannot choose for you, but I can help you make your own right choice. ¹² "Many are called but few are chosen" should be, "All are called but few choose to listen." ¹³ Therefore, they do not choose right. ¹⁴ The "chosen ones" are merely those who choose right sooner. ¹⁵ Right minds can do this now, and they will find rest unto their souls. ¹⁶ God knows you only in peace, and this is your reality.